On the social web, however, this birthday is bittersweet. Between birthday wishes, Miyamoto faces flack from People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) and lukewarm reviews for his latest game.

As with Grand Theft Auto and Skyrim, it takes just one big video game to unleash the social media hype-beast. Miyamoto, the mastermind behind a dozen massive video games, enjoyed this phenomenon proportionately. A birthday tribute made it to r/gaming’s front page.

“I'm glad to have grown up playing this man's creations and continue to do so, and
I look forward to his future creations. Happy Birthday Shigeru Miyamoto! Thank you for a very awesome childhood,” wrote redditor Anteres.

Miyamoto’s birthday wishes also consumed the morning’s Twitter traffic, with thousands of mentions, though no global trending topic.

“Happy birthday Shigeru Miyamoto! You're probably the reason why I make games for a living,” tweeted @majesticxii.

However, not everything was Super Mario sunshine and rainbows for Miyamoto today. The game creator also faces ho-hum reviews for his upcoming game, The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword.

“@guycocker It's Shigeru Miyamoto's birthday and you gave his game a 7. Why didn't you just SHIT ON HIS CEREAL YOU MONSTERS,” tweeted @britishgaming.

PETA has also found Miyamoto’s birthday week an opportune time to begin railing on him. The controversial animal rights group is upset with Miyamoto’s most recent release, Super Mario 3D Land, because Mario wears a fur suit supposedly made from the fictional “Tanooki.”

Seasoned gamers looking to relive their glory days will soon have an all-new reason to do so thanks to Nintendo . On Thursday the company announced the upcoming re-launch of the NES—yes, the original Nintendo Entertainment System is coming back, albeit in a much smaller form factor.